---------Christy Mathewson, Giants' P, 1908, Polo Grounds
-------Notice how he has cut off the sleeve of his throwing arm.
http://img148.imageshack.us/img148/1083/mattyph9.jpg

---Ty Cobb (1920), wearing an armband as a tribute to Ray Chapman
http://img359.imageshack.us/img359/6181/cobbvk0.jpg

------------Game in 1910, Hilltop Park, NY. Notice how far Hal Chase ranges off 1B.
-----With Chase not holding the runner, why is the runner not going down to 2B?
http://img359.imageshack.us/img359/369/halchaseai6.jpg

--Coogan's Bluff Overlooking Polo Grounds, home of the Giants/Mets. Notice the fans who climbed the trees to see the baseball games for free.
http://img234.imageshack.us/img234/5559/coogansblufffo7.jpg

With Chase not holding the runner, why is the runner not going down to 2B?

Is there a runner on 2nd as well? Can't tell for sure, but that may be part of a shadow on the far left part of the picture. Looks like Chase was drawn in, as if it might be a bunt situation.

RFS62

11-15-2006, 03:17 PM

Awesome stuff, Cyclone.

Thanks for the link.

:beerme:

pedro

11-15-2006, 03:20 PM

thanks! those are awesome.

Cyclone792

11-15-2006, 03:31 PM

Fun stuff. will have to investigate that site more fully.

Is there a runner on 2nd as well? Can't tell for sure, but that may be part of a shadow on the far left part of the picture. Looks like Chase was drawn in, as if it might be a bunt situation.

With the way the other shadows are pointing, that very well may be the case. It looks like that actual pitch is being popped up behind the plate by the batter, which along with Chase's positioning may explain how far the first base runner is off the first base bag.

I was browsing through a bunch of photos and historical content over there earlier today and completely lost track of time. The volume of historical content and photos they've put together is simply amazing.

vaticanplum

11-15-2006, 06:44 PM

Who's Ray Chapman? Is that the dude who got nailed in the head?

Love, love that photo of the Polo Grounds.

paulrichjr

11-15-2006, 11:19 PM

Who's Ray Chapman? Is that the dude who got nailed in the head?

Love, love that photo of the Polo Grounds.

It was

Heath

11-15-2006, 11:37 PM

Who's Ray Chapman? Is that the dude who got nailed in the head?

Carl Mays, a noted submariner who also liked to pitch inside, got too close in a game in September of '20. At that time, Chapman's Indians were battling the Yanks and White Sox in a close AL Pennant.

After Mays plunked Chapman, Ray lived a few days before dying. Cleveland kept the lead and won a World Series.

Ray Chapman was a revered figure in Cleveland. He married a girl whose father was an executive with East Ohio Gas Company. After he died, she wandered around life and I believe she committed suicide not long after the beaning.

I can't remember the book, (it might have been Baseball America by Donald Honig) that went into detail on Chapman's life. Very interesting.

By the way, Mays wasn't much liked after that. A few teams bounced around an idea to ban him. He pitched a few more years in New York and then surfaced in Cincinnati. He had some solid years in Cincinnati in the mid-20's as part of a rotaion with Luque, Donohoe, and Rixey, pitching in the "Almost" year of '26.

traderumor

11-15-2006, 11:59 PM

This is a great site (http://www.geocities.com/dewing19/)for 60s-80s photos. I think its this gentleman's personal collection.

RANDY IN INDY

11-16-2006, 11:03 AM

That is a great site, traderumor. Thanks! Some great Reds photos from Crosley in the late 60's.

cincinnati chili

11-18-2006, 10:54 AM

Question for Boston resident (and those who know the geography). What is that dome in the background in the picture of Fenway in 1914? I don't think it's the state house, as it would be too far away and off to the left.

I especially love the photos of Ewell Blackwell and Ebbets Field. I didn't realize it until just now, but the original dimensions in Ebbets Field were 419 feet to the left field pole and 477 feet to center field but only 301 to the right field pole. Wow. Imagine how fun it was pitching in that ballpark during its early years.

Cyclone792

07-06-2008, 09:00 PM

Ty Cobb crossing the plate after hitting a home run against the Yankees in 1926:

For those who know, what part of Cincinnati was Crosley Field located in? I've always wondered that.

Cyclone792

07-06-2008, 09:13 PM

In the Ty Cobb photo, who is the guy holding the bat with street clothes on? Maybe a bat boy?

That'd be my best guess, but maybe woy or somebody else would know a bit more.

For those who know, what part of Cincinnati was Crosley Field located in? I've always wondered that.

From Where's Crosley Now? (http://www.crosley-field.com/)

http://www.crosley-field.com/images/locate.gif

Always Red

07-06-2008, 09:16 PM

Today, the Berning Printing Company (easily seen from I-75) is where the old scoreboard once stood.

Roy Tucker

07-06-2008, 10:51 PM

That'd be my best guess, but maybe woy or somebody else would know a bit more.

From Where's Crosley Now? (http://www.crosley-field.com/)

http://www.crosley-field.com/images/locate.gif

And there used to be a ballpark
Where the field was warm and green
And the people played their crazy game
With a joy I’d never seen.
And the air was such a wonder
From the hot dogs and the beer
Yes, there used a ballpark, right here.

And there used to be rock candy
And a great big fourth of july
With fireworks exploding
All across the summer sky
And the people watched in wonder
How they’d laugh and how they’d cheer
And there used to be a ballpark, right here.

Now the children try to find it
And they can’t believe their eyes
`cause the old team just isn’t playing
And the new team hardly tries
And the sky has got so cloudy
When it used to be so clear
And the summer went so quickly this year.

Yes, there used to be a ballpark, right here.

westofyou

07-06-2008, 10:58 PM

I believe this may be a 1940 World Series shot of Crosley Field, but I'm not for sure:

Hierloom Beer was brewed by the Heidelberg Brewing Company in Covington, KY...I believe they were the original supplier for the Dayton-based Heidelberg Distributing Company who are still in operation today.

NJReds

07-07-2008, 05:08 PM

Morgan looks like a little leaguer in that picture. I forgot how small he was. It's incredible that he put up the power numbers that he did.

Always Red

07-07-2008, 05:38 PM

Ever notice how the catcher is always in more of a half-standing up position in these old photos; not in the modern day crouch? I wonder when that started happening?

westofyou

07-07-2008, 05:48 PM

Ever notice how the catcher is always in more of a half-standing up position in these old photos; not in the modern day crouch? I wonder when that started happening?
The high strike used to be way more prevalent and that meant the catcher was more prone to looking like he was standing. After 1969 they changed the strike zone and pushed it down, plus the slider and other pitches that were lower forced the catcher down to protect against the passed ball.

Here's a bevy of catcher stuff from the 19th century.

http://www.redszone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=58287

Always Red

07-07-2008, 06:24 PM

The high strike used to be way more prevalent and that meant the catcher was more prone to looking like he was standing. After 1969 they changed the strike zone and pushed it down, plus the slider and other pitches that were lower forced the catcher down to protect against the passed ball.

Here's a bevy of catcher stuff from the 19th century.

http://www.redszone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=58287

Great stuff (as always) on that catchers thread, woy- thanks!

But I think the modern crouch pre-dated the lowering of the mound (and the strike zone with it). Here are a few of the pics I was able to find from pre-1969. McCarver (from the '68 WS), Berra (mostly) and Campanella (definitely) are all in the familiar crouch. Del Crandall, who was widely considered a fine defensive catcher in the NL during the 1950's, is seen in a crouch (on a later baseball card), as well as the "modified crouch" on the cover of SI.

My hunch is that it had less to do with lowering the mound, and as you said- more to do with the advent of the slider. But I'm guessing!

A Chronological Examination of the Official Rules
Strikezone Official Rules & Definitions

1996

The Strike Zone is expanded on the lower end, moving from the top of the knees to the bottom of the knees.

1988

The Strike Zone is that area over home plate the upper limit of which is a horizontal line at the midpoint between the top of the shoulders and the top of the uniform pants, and the lower level is a line at the top of the knees. The Strike Zone shall be determined from the batter's stance as the batter is prepared to swing at a pitched ball.

1969

The Strike Zone is that space over home plate which is between the batter's armpits and the top of his knees when he assumes a natural stance. The umpire shall determine the Strike Zone according to the batter's usual stance when he swings at a pitch.

1963

The Strike Zone is that space over home plate which is between the top of the batter's shoulders and his knees when he assumes his natural stance. The umpire shall determine the Strike Zone according to the batter's usual stance when he swings at a pitch.

1957

A strike is a legal pitch when so called by the umpire which:

(a) is struck at by the batter and is missed;
(b) enters the Strike Zone in flight and is not struck at;
(c) is fouled by the batter when he has less than two strikes at it;
(d) is bunted foul;
(e) touches the batter as he strikes at it;
(f) touches the batter in flight in the Strike Zone; or
(g) becomes a foul tip. Note:
(f) was added to the former rule and definition.

1950

The Strike Zone is that space over home plate which is between the batter's armpits and the top of his knees when he assumes his natural stance.

1910

With the bases unoccupied, any ball delivered by the pitcher while either foot is not in contact with the pitcher's plate shall be called a ball by the umpire.

1907

A fairly delivered ball is a ball pitched or thrown to the bat by the pitcher while standing in his position and facing the batsman that passes over any portion of the home base, before touching the ground, not lower than the batsman's knee, nor higher than his shoulder. For every such fairly delivered ball, the umpire shall call one strike.

An unfairly delivered ball is a ball delivered to the bat by the pitcher while standing in his position and facing the batsman that does not pass over any portion of the home base between the batsman's shoulder and knees, or that touches the ground before passing home base, unless struck at by the batsman. For every unfairly delivered ball the umpire shall call one ball.

1901

A foul hit ball not caught on the fly is a strike unless two strikes have already been called. Adopted by National League in 1901 and the American League in 1903.

1899

A foul tip by the batter, caught by the catcher while standing within the lines of his position is a strike.

1894

A strike is called when the batter makes a foul hit, other than a foul tip, while attempting a bunt hit that falls or rolls upon foul ground between home base and first or third bases.

1887

The batter can no longer call for a 'high' or 'low' pitch.

A (strike) is defined as a pitch that 'passes over home plate not lower than the batsman's knee, nor higher than his shoulders.

1876

The batsman, on taking his position, must call for a 'high,' 'low,' or 'fair' pitch, and the umpire shall notify the pitcher to deliver the ball as required; such a call cannot be changed after the first pitch is delivered.

High - pitches over the plate between the batter's waist and shoulders

Low - pitches over the plate between the batter's waist and at least one foot from the ground.

Fair - pitches over the plate between the batter's shoulders and at least one foot from the ground.

OnBaseMachine

07-07-2008, 09:30 PM

The high strike used to be way more prevalent and that meant the catcher was more prone to looking like he was standing. After 1969 they changed the strike zone and pushed it down, plus the slider and other pitches that were lower forced the catcher down to protect against the passed ball.

Here's a bevy of catcher stuff from the 19th century.

http://www.redszone.com/forums/showthread.php?t=58287

Is there anything you don't know about baseball? :D I always pride myself on knowing a lot about baseball but I ain't nothing compared to you.

Thanks for posting these pictures! They are great. Pictures like these are really good historically that show how things gradually and not so gradually change.
I can remember riding on I-75 by Crosley Field after it closed. It looked so sad sitting there empty.

FWIW, that's my favorite Reds uniform ever- simply red and white. These were worn from 1968-1971. No drop shadows, no black, no piping, no pinstripes. Great pic, Roy- thanks for posting!

George Anderson

07-08-2008, 10:03 AM

Thanks for posting these pictures! They are great. Pictures like these are really good historically that show how things gradually and not so gradually change.
I can remember riding on I-75 by Crosley Field after it closed. It looked so sad sitting there empty.

When did the bulldoze Crosley?

westofyou

07-08-2008, 10:09 AM

When did the bulldoze Crosley?

April 1972

Pete Rose Jr. sat in his daddy's lap and pulled the lever for the wrecking ball (painted like a baseball) to make its first strike.

http://baseballminutia.com/images/firstblow.jpg

Roy Tucker

07-08-2008, 10:32 AM

More post-baseball Crosley Field picts when used as an impound lot (a little sad, really)...

http://www.crosley-field.com/images/autolot.jpg

http://www.crosley-field.com/images/autolot2.jpg

http://www.crosley-field.com/images/impound.jpg

George Anderson

07-08-2008, 10:35 AM

Was any part of the scoreboard saved or was it all just trashed?

Roy Tucker

07-08-2008, 10:52 AM

Was any part of the scoreboard saved or was it all just trashed?

From the excellent web site http://www.crosley-field.com/

The New Crosley...

The following is an excerpt from the book Diamonds by Michael Gershman.

"Field of Dreams"
Crosley Field is the only major league ballpark to be brought back to life, and it happened twice, in two different states. The first time it was resurrected by Larry Luebbers, a ham salesman and real estate broker from Union, Kentucky. When parts of Crosley were auctioned off in 1970 by King Wrecking Company, Luebbers, a lifelong Reds fan, went to buy two seats as souvenirs, but, he said, "I got kind of carried away...before I knew it, I had the walls and the scoreboard too."

Fortunately, Luebbers had a 206-acre back yard to hold his treasures. Before the wreckers arrived to dismantle Crosley, he took exact measurements of the 40-foot terrace, which made outfielders backpeddal uphill, and the left field (328) and right field (366) lines. He then spent $8,000 bulldozing his meadow, raising it 6 feet, and leveling it off. Over a two-year period, he had the 65-foot scoreboard repainted. He rebuilt the 60-foot flagpole after it cracked into three pieces. He sawed the ticket office in half so that it could be moved across an Ohio River bridge and nailed back together.

Luebbers also liberated the old popcorn stand, the Reds locker room, the WCKY-WLW broadcast booth, a sign advertising "the new 1970 Dodge," the bat rack, and the pitching rubber. The bartender at a saloon called the Dugout, just across from Crosley II (Luebbers's name for the park), said, "Well, there's some that like to collect old cards. Larry, there, he just likes to collect old ball fields." Not only collect but use. Spectators sitting in the 400 seats he salvaged saw Union's Knothole League team play, and those interested in becoming patrons could have their names inscribed on specific seats for $25.

That would have been it except that Crosley II mysteriously disappeared. In 1987, Luebbers took an extended trip before retiring to Arizona. He told the Cincinnati Enquirer, "The property was sold when I was out of town...when I came back, it was torn down."

The mystery might never have come to light except that Marvin Thompson had a dream, much like the one Ray Kinsella has in the movie Field of Dreams. Thompson is the city manager of Blue Ash, the small town northeast of Cincinnati which had been a possible site for the Reds' new ballpark; while it lost out on the new one, it wound up getting the old one.

In 1985, Blue Ash was planning a baseball and soccer complex, and Thompson remembered hearing of a proposed softball field that would have recreated two major league parks. Thompson got the idea of reconstructing Crosley, and Blue Ash quickly put together a committee that raised $100,000.

Mark Rohr, an intern in Thompson's office, worked diligently to find out exactly what of Crosley remained. Inevitably, he looked up Luebbers and discovered that the only thing left was a ticket booth, which had been sold to the town by Luebber's mother. Rohr pressed on and eventually located more than 600 of the original seats with the distinctive wishbone "C." According to Sports Illustrated, he found 350 underneath the Butler County Fairgrounds in Hamilton, Ohio, another 100 at a softball complex in northern Kentucky, and 100 more at a skating rink in Loveland, Colorado. Most important, Matty Schwab's grandson donated the original architect's drawings; Blue Ash raised another $350,000 and began rebuilding Crosley in earnest.

The Reds, who had nothing to do with Luebbers, got behind the Blue Ash project and created an Old Timers Game to dedicate it on July 11, 1988. Former Cincinnati pitcher Jim O'Toole was involved from the beginning. He says, "It was built as a reminder of the past. Any father from around here enjoys watching his kid play at this Crosley because he remembers his father taking him to the real Crosley as a kid."

A real-estate agent and ham salesman named Larry Luebbers, who once quit the seminary so he could listen to Reds games, went to old Crosley Field looking for souvenirs and wound up with most of the park

Roy Bongartz

Crosley Field was the smallest baseball park in the major leagues, but it sure looks big in Larry Luebbers' backyard. When the Cincinnati Reds moved from Crosley to the new Riverfront Stadium in 1970, the old field on Western Avenue was set for the wrecker's ball until Luebbers showed up with the idea of buying a couple of the seats as souvenirs. "I got started and I just couldn't get stopped," he says cheerfully as he sits at his kitchen table sipping a beer and gazing out through the sliding glass doors at Crosley Field—or, at least, a substantial portion of it—reincarnated. There is the ticket office with the sign BOX SEATS $3.00 RESERVED GRANDSTAND $2.50. There is the bat rack from which Johnny Bench and Pete Rose chose their weapons. There is the left-field line precisely 328 feet long and the right-field line stretching 366 feet to the foul pole. And there, in the distance, is the terrace that slopes up to a height of four feet and used to throw visiting outfielders off balance, causing them to fall down and miss fly balls. On the left field wall, there is a billboard with a 30-foot-long Pepsi-Cola bottle on it; alongside is a huge picture of a 1970 Dodge and another vast advertisement reading WIEDEMANN BEER.

There also is the dugout from which Manager Bill McKechnie directed the Reds to the world championship in 1940. And there is the hole Birdie Tebbetts poked in the dugout wall to blow smoke through in order to beat the no-smoking rule. There is the original 60-foot flagpole and, just outside the gate, a souvenir stand advertising autographed balls for $3, history books, ties, T shirts, coolie hats, opera glasses, yearbooks, pennants, bats, badges, pins and caps, all with the big Cincinnati "C" on them. What makes the scene slightly jarring is the view of a rambling barn off to one side of the diamond and, visible through the chain link fence at the limits of the outfield, a herd of cattle grazing on a hillside. What Luebbers has done is set up Crosley Field in the middle of innocent farmland near the town of Union, Ky., about 15 miles south of Cincinnati . A good deal of it he hauled over, bit by bit, in his beat-up station wagon.

The first thing out-of-town visitors ask Luebbers, who is 35, stands 6'2" and sells real estate and country hams for a living, is why he did it. Luebbers will say, "I don't really know. I guess I just wanted to." A further hint comes from Luebbers' blonde, slightly built wife Gloria, a former model who now works in Luebbers' real-estate office just down the road, except when she is preparing to give birth to another small Luebbers; there are now six, and it is no secret that Larry hopes to sire his own baseball team. Says Gloria, "If you don't like baseball around here you're in trouble." Luebbers admits that he "got carried away," but says the field is a good place for the local kids to play.

Besides spending what will probably amount to $35,000 by the time he has finished the resurrection of Crosley Field, Luebbers also has paid $20 apiece for uniforms for the 70 local kids in the D-Minor Knothole League who use the grounds nearly every day after school and on weekends. Luebbers had to get a waiver on the league's minimum-age requirement of seven, so his 6-year-old son Larry Jr. (Lubie) could play with a team in his old man's big-league ball park. The kid has already pitched a pair of no-hitters.

Luebbers has always been a Reds fan, first as a boy in Cincinnati and later as a student at St. Pius X Seminary across the Ohio River , where he studied for the priesthood until the fifth inning of the last game in the 1961 World Series. "It was the first Reds pennant since 1940, and I was watching the game on TV," he says. " Waite Hoyt was doing the commentating, and just as Wally Post hit a homer, this priest shows up and clicks off the set and tells me to get back to my studies. Right away I thought, 'Is this my life or not?' and I walked out of there and never went back."

Soon Luebbers was pitching for Thomas More College in Covington , Ky., and later he played semipro ball in the Buckeye League, where the teams have such sponsors as Oertels 92 beer and Bavarian Breweries. "It was always in the back of my mind to get into the majors," he says. But the closest Luebbers got was a visit from a Pittsburgh Pirate scout, who watched him give up 27 hits. Needless to say, the scout did not sign Luebbers.

In more recent years, Luebbers has pitched in softball tournaments, but the mental picture of himself swatting one over the fence in Crosley Field apparently never was erased from his mind. So when the left-field wall was finally put in place behind his house, Luebbers took Lubie out to give it a whirl. "It was almost too dark to play," he recalls, "but I wanted to be the first one to do it. Lubie gave me a nice fat pitch, and I put it right over that wall. I hit the very first home run in this place."

Putting the field into shape—an $8,500 bulldozing and landfill job to duplicate the contours of the original, installing 400 Crosley Field seats, the not-yet completed placement of the huge scoreboard with its five-foot-long second hand—has not been all beer and skittles for Luebbers and the friends he presses into service on the interminable trips back and forth over the Ohio River between Kentucky and Cincinnati . The Boone County zoning board questioned the erection of the scoreboard on the grounds that the laws made no provision for a monstrous lighted sign rising 55 feet into the air, but relented when Luebbers threatened to call off all the kids' ball games if he could not have his scoreboard.

Luebbers took two boys from Union to help him remove the 60-foot flagpole from Crosley, which at the time was being used as a lot for cars impounded by the Cincinnati police. "There were a lot of pretty nice cars in there," Luebbers says. He tells how the two boys mishandled the ropes on the flagpole after it had been cut free at the base. Over it went, seemingly headed directly for a neat row of car roofs. But somehow it landed smack between the autos, breaking into three pieces—it was made of cast iron—but doing no other damage. "It was a miracle," Luebbers says offhandedly, as if he might still be benefiting from some special pull he picked up at the seminary. He and the boys gathered up the pieces, stowed them in the wagon and brought them back to Union, where they were welded together. The great pole now stands in Crosley Field once more. Luebbers also had trouble with the very heavy ticket office that he wanted. He cut it in half with a chain saw and early one Sunday he and a friend loaded half of it aboard a flatbed trailer and headed for Kentucky . Because of the awkward load, it took them three hours and 20 minutes to make the 30-mile round trip, and when they got back to Crosley somebody had stolen the other half of the ticket office.

"We also had trouble with that popcorn stand," Luebbers says. A crane broke while lifting it. And when Luebbers tried to dismantle the stand with a chain saw, that broke, too. "Finally we used the headache ball and knocked the thing to pieces," he says.

Meanwhile, the mortgage holders on Luebbers' 206 acres of rolling farmland—he leases the rest of it for grazing and tobacco growing—were dubious about the value of a baseball field on their property. That is, until Luebbers was able to pay them off. Now he stands proudly at the entrance gate of the park, leaning against a post and taking in his masterpiece with serene pleasure. "You know, I wonder how it would be, selling this house and land with a major league baseball field on it," he says. "If I ever wanted to sell, well, maybe some people wouldn't appreciate having Crosley Field. Old people, maybe."

One of Luebbers' cronies, Boone County Judge Bruce Ferguson, comes up to watch the kids practice sliding into third along a very muddy base path, and he needles his friend gently. "It looks pretty good, Larry, but I think you really ought to fix it up more. You ought to touch up those billboards and I think you should have got the original grass from Cincinnati ," Ferguson says. It turns out that Luebbers, who is entirely unperturbed by what anybody in Union may think of his project, has already arranged with Sweetie Meyer, a sign painter who hangs out in the Bull Pen, a tavern across the highway from the farmhouse, to work on the signs. By a coincidence, which seems typical of the scene here, Meyers painted the original advertisements some years ago at Crosley Field. And the Bull Pen was owned partly by the late Jim McGlothlin, who started the last game for the Reds at Crosley.

McGlothlin, who lived a couple of miles down the road from the new field, said in an interview before his death last year that the players were mostly interested in their new stadium back in 1970 and didn't much care that they were losing Crosley Field. "The stands were all greasy and dirty and the fences were too short," he said. Of his friend Luebbers' obsession, he said, "The kids seem to like it O.K." By and large the people of Union have taken the advent of Crosley Field in their midst very calmly. When they drive along the highway they scarcely look up at the billboards and the bleachers outlined against the hilltop behind Luebbers' house. The bartender at the Bull Pen says, "I guess there's some that thinks he's crazy, but he don't care. Some guys collect old cars. Larry collects old ball fields."

Still, the last game at Crosley Field on June 24, 1970 did evoke some emotion from the fans as the Reds beat the San Francisco Giants 5-4 with back-to-back home runs by Bench and Lee May in the eighth inning. "So it ended to the cheers of 28,027 wonderful people who came out to give old Crosley Field a final goodby," wrote Bob Hertzel in the Cincinnati Enquirer . Wayne Granger, who relieved McGlothlin that day, says, "I got back to the clubhouse and looked for the champagne. I felt just like we had won the World Series." William R. Powers, a ball boy for 37 seasons, told Tommy West of the Enquirer, "What do you expect? It's like losing an old friend." An Associated Press photographer figured out that he had seen 2,200 Reds games since he started taking pictures at Crosley in 1938, and before the game Si Burick, the sports editor of the Dayton Daily News , pronounced a public epitaph for the field: "Rest in peace."

After the Reds won, West wrote, "The fans were screaming, and somewhere a lot of old baseball greats who once played on this field must have been smiling." Home plate was then presented to the mayor; the bases went to lucky fans whose ticket numbers had been drawn. One newspaper story reported that "Mary Jane Gill, 12, Dover , Ky., said that she doesn't know what she will do with second base." At 10:56 p.m. a band played Auld Lang Syne. The fans were all standing, many weeping, among them Hugh Hanley, 98, who had been rooting for the Reds in various stadiums at the same location since 1897. Former Reds General Manager Warren Giles cried before the game and again after the game. "I'm not ashamed," he said.

A boy from Dayton scooped up some dirt in a paper cup, but there were no signs of vandalism as the crowd departed. A newspaper story described what happened then: "The big lights went off. A few remained on, but the people had gone. All but one. One man sat alone in the shadows. He had a half smile on his face, and he kept looking all around, up and down. He said he was Frank O'Toole, of Western Hills. He was the last man left when they turned off the lights at Crosley Field."

In the taverns of Cincinnati that night the beer flowed in rivers, and there was talk of the early days of the Reds and of the Red Stockings before them. They were the world's first professional baseball team; in their first season, 1869, they played 69 games and won them all. It took nine balls for a walk in those days, and the batter had two chances on a called third strike. The Reds had an even earlier predecessor in the Cincinnati Baseball Club, a group of amateurs, mostly young lawyers, who played their games early in the morning before work. Their teams were called the Morning Glories and the Wide Awakes.

Memories of the old days were reported in the weeks that followed. Edd Roush, who played on the Reds between 1917 and 1927, recalled, "I remember the dead ball. The umpires used to have only about half a dozen baseballs for the game, and we'd use only one, maybe two balls a game. You never did see a white baseball in those days. All the infielders used to chew tobacco, and by the time the ball was thrown around the infield, it was covered with tobacco juice. Everyone used to spit on it."

Crosley was quickly forgotten when 51,786-seat Riverfront Stadium opened the following week. Two years later—after Luebbers had got most of what he could carry away—the wrecker's ball finally struck the concrete and steel of the old park. The iron ball was painted white with black stitching as a sort of salute to Giles , again on hand but smiling this time, and to the present Reds manager, Sparky Anderson , who had come out to pay their last respects. Since then, the Reds and their fans have pretty well ignored Luebbers' rebirth of Crosley over in Kentucky . It is true that George Scherger, the Reds' third-base coach, has been living at the Luebbers', but he stays there mainly to fish for bass and bluegills in a pond on Luebbers' property.

When Luebbers heard that Reds President Robert Howsam wanted some old Crosley seats for his home, he had eight of them scraped, scrubbed and repainted and sent them to Howsam as a present. But the gift was very belatedly acknowledged. So Luebbers has been left just about alone to enjoy his field and its history—the pennants won there in 1919, 1939, 1940 and 1961; the 1937 flood during which Pitchers Lee Grissom and Gene Schott rowed a boat over the center-field wall; the first major league night game in 1935, when Franklin D. Roosevelt switched on the stadium lights from the White House ; the Siebler Suit sign (HIT THIS AND WIN A SIEBLER SUIT) that cost Siebler 104 suits over the years; and a total of 4,542 regular-season National League games.

As Luebbers drives around looking over real-estate deals in the neighboring communities—Sugar Tit, Rabbit Hash, Big Bone Lick—or checks on supplies of country hams in stores in northern Kentucky , he seems to be a man who has found a certain peace, and the fact that few visitors from outside of Union come to his field does not bother him. He seems disposed to keep his Crosley Field private. His ball park gives him a chance to do a lot of things he likes. "I take the kids on Lubie's team into the old locker room and yell at them," he says. "They need a lot of instruction. But some of the parents worry about me treating them too rough. Well, the parents can't hear me in there." He's got a mud slide, which he never had as a kid, and in the hallway of his house, which runs the length of the ground floor, he has a batting machine. "I always wanted to be able to play strikeout in the house when I was a kid," he says. Now he and Lubie hit balls all winter, and the windows on both sides of the entrance door are patched with sheet metal and cardboard.

"People think I must be getting a tax write-off, but it's not so," Luebbers says. "All I've made so far is $2.50 on the Coke machine, and I've sold four $25 season tickets." (Such benefactors get a Crosley Field chair with their name painted on the back.)

Other stadiums have disappeared in recent years, some leaving barely a trace: Braves Field in Boston , Griffith Stadium in Washington , Connie Mack Stadium in Philadelphia , Forbes Field in Pittsburgh , the Polo Grounds in New York , Ebbets Field in Brooklyn , Sportsman's Park in St. Louis . Crosley Field was torn down, too, yet it lives on in Larry Luebbers' backyard.

June 25, 1990
Cincy's Crosley Field Reborn
That cozy diamond has reappeared 15 miles north
Steve Hymon

It would be easy to wipe away the tears and call the 1990 Academy Award nominee film Field of Dreams just a fantasy. But only if you haven't been to Crosley Field lately.

Lately?

Sure, the original Crosley Field, home of the Cincinnati Reds from 1912 to 1970, was demolished in 1972, and on its site now stands an industrial park. But drive 15 miles north to Blue Ash and there it is: Crosley Field, back from the grave.

Marvin Thompson, 38, Blue Ash's city manager, is the real-life counterpart of Ray Kinsella, the fictional Iowa farmer who resurrected his father and his father's favorite players by constructing a ball field in Field of Dreams. Like Kinsella, Thompson thought that if Crosley was rebuilt, someone would come, look and play. Unlike Kinsella, he was not considered crazy; in fact, a whole town believed in him. "Marvin's never steered us wrong before," says Blue Ash mayor Robert Schueler, who figured that, at the least, Thompson's idea would give the city something no one else had.

Indeed, Thompson soon found he was not alone in his dream; more than 3,000 people came out for the dedication of the new Crosley, an occasion that featured a Reds old-timers' game on July 11, 1988. Last summer the old-timers' game at Crosley drew 5,000 people for what will be an annual August event.

Old-timers aren't the only ones getting familiar with the park. The new Crosley is also used by many people who never saw the original, including two local high school teams, a summer college league, advanced knothole baseball teams and others lucky enough to be able to reserve time on the field.

The appeal of the park is the detail that Thompson has put into his replica. The new park duplicates old Crosley's outfield dimensions (328 feet down the leftfield line, 366 down right and 387 straightaway center); it has that famed rising terrace (instead of a warning track, Crosley's outfield had a 4-foot upward slope to the outfield wall); and it has the same 58-foot-tall scoreboard in left center. In addition, 300 seats from the old park have been refurbished to form a small grandstand.

Jim Greengrass, the Reds' leftfielder from 1952 to 1955, came from his Marietta, Ga. , home to play in last year's old-timers' game and loved what he saw: "They said something about Crosley Field, but I didn't think it would be like this. Johnny Temple [ Cincinnati second baseman from 1952 to '59 and in '64] and I almost cried out there, looking at the old scoreboard and terrace." A breath later, Greengrass adds, " Rogers Hornsby [the Reds manager in 1952 and '53] used to run us up that damned terrace a hundred times a day."

"It was built as a reminder of the past," says Jim O'Toole , who pitched for the Reds from 1958 to '66 and has been loosely linked to the project since its inception. "Any father from around here enjoys watching his kid play at this Crosley because he remembers his father taking him to the real Crosley as a kid." O'Toole 's point is well-taken, because that's how this whole thing got started.

Thompson, a native of Miamisburg, 45 miles north of Cincinnati , fell in love with the Reds shortly after his father, Walter, took him to Crosley in the early 1960s. The Reds responded to the boy's devotion by repeatedly breaking his heart, the most crushing blow being their loss of the pennant to St. Louis on the final day of the 1964 season.

As the Reds floundered for the rest of the decade, the trips to Crosley became more precious to Thompson, if only because they were now fewer and farther between. Not surprisingly, Thompson has seen many more games since the Reds moved into Riverfront Stadium , and he is a realist regarding Crosley's demise. "I think Riverfront is great," he says. "The Reds couldn't have survived in Crosley unless they expanded it. They needed a bigger ballpark, and they needed someplace for the [ NFL ] Bengals. It made sense economically. They might have lost the team to another city. It's just unfortunate that Crosley couldn't have been kept as a premier field for college play or a top-notch knothole field. I don't personally think the land at that location was so valuable the stadium had to come down."

When Thompson speaks of property or land values, people listen. Since his arrival in Blue Ash in 1973, the residential population of the city has grown from 8,500 to 13,000 and 37% of its acreage is devoted to industrial parks and office-complexes. Blue Ash now can claim more than 70,000 daytime workers. "By expanding like that," Thompson says, "we have the money to do things other places only dream about."

In 1985, Blue Ash was planning a youth baseball and soccer complex, with two of the projected 10 ballfields to have big league dimensions. But in the back of Thompson's mind was a conversation he had heard about a private Softball complex that was planned to re-create a couple of major league ballparks. "We were thinking of doing something like that at the sports center," says Thompson. "Then we thought we would tie in Crosley and really try to re-create it." When pressed, Thompson drops the "we" and admits Crosley was his idea.

The people in Blue Ash were aware that, for the most part, old ballparks were simply demolished, not reverently dismantled. But if there was anything left of the original Crosley, Blue Ash wanted it, and a fund-raising committee was formed with a nest egg of $100,000 (eventually, the Blue Ash treasury would be called on for an additional $350,000). Mark Rohr, an intern in the city manager's department, was assigned the duty of finding whatever was left of the original park. "I felt like a private investigator," says Rohr. "We kept finding bits and pieces of memorabilia. Over time, we started getting publicity, and that fueled the fire."

And cleaned out the closets. Blue Ash would eventually recover more than 600 seats from the original Crosley; 350 were discovered stored underneath the Butler County Fairground's grandstand in Hamilton , Ohio , another 100 were found at a softball complex in northern Kentucky , and 100 more someone had bought for a suburban skating rink in Loveland , Ohio .

A field microphone, concession signs, pennants from the old stadium's rooftop and a ticket booth were either given or sold to Blue Ash. A more valuable find was the original architect's drawings of Crosley, which had been saved by former Reds groundskeeper Matty Schwab's grandson. Those sketches, combined with old photographs, aided Blue Ash in duplicating the unique terrace and odd angles of the outfield wall.

Some finds were more unusual. Blue Ash administrator Jenny Ramsey discovered that Marilyn Moore, a Cincinnati native, had saved a jar of dirt from the original Crosley (as well as from five other major league ballparks). But when asked to sprinkle some of her dirt on the new Crosley, Moore balked at the idea. "I wasn't sure it belonged there," she says. "I thought Crosley belonged in the city of Cincinnati ." Finally, a trip to the new Crosley—and the sight of a particular ticket booth-was enough to persuade Moore to agree to perform a ceremonial sprinkling of dirt on the new Crosley's Opening Day. "I've come to terms with it," says Moore. "It took me a long while, but my hat is off to them." Unfortunately, she was late for the dedication, and the dirt is still in its jar in her home.

Rohr also discovered that Blue Ash was not the first community to attempt a re-creation of Crosley Field. Larry Luebbers of Union, Ky., had bought many of Crosley's salvageable parts (including the scoreboard and dugouts) for a ballpark that he, like Kinsella, had built on his farm (SI, Sept. 20, 1976). But under somewhat mysterious circumstances, the park disappeared in the late 1970s. In 1987, shortly before he retired and moved to Arizona , Luebbers told The Cincinnati Enquirer, "The property was sold when I was out of town...when I came back it was torn down." Though Rohr made several expeditions to Kentucky and heard rumors that parts of Crosley still existed under lock and key, all that Blue Ash got for his efforts was another ticket booth, sold to the town by Luebbers's mother.

With the project now mostly complete, Blue Ash plans to add new elements to Crosley whenever they—and the money to buy them—become available. For example, this year it will expand the seating and put up a flagpole to the right of the scoreboard like the one at the original park.

In 1991, Thompson would like the old-timers' game to be a re-creation of the 1961 World Series, in which the Yankees beat the Reds four games to one. He already has signed up Game 1 pitcher—and loser—O'Toole.

But, for all that Thompson has poured into the park, there still is something missing. Walter Thompson, 68, has been ill and, thus far, has been unable to see the monument his son has built to the memories they share. When Walter visits the park, then the new Crosley will truly be a Field of Dreams.

Always Red

07-08-2008, 11:23 AM

Interesting.

I wonder where the scoreboard is that Luebbers salvaged.- you know it's out there, somewhere...

Cyclone792

07-08-2008, 07:29 PM

Thanks to a brilliant thread over on Baseball Fever: http://www.baseball-fever.com/showthread.php?t=75607

Baseball Fever BSmile has worked on a ton of pictures, some of which I'll post over the next few posts. If you've got a widescreen monitor, stretch these babies out:

Note from OP at BF: Here's a pretty cool panoramic of Fenway Park. I made it using three different pictures...taken on September 29, 1912. Of course the lighting wasn't exactly the same (especially the middle) and a few things don't line up perfectly...but it still provides a neat and large scale view of Fenway from the outfield bleachers WAY back in the day.

Correction: Since I'm unable to edit ... this picture was actually from Game 1 of the 1940 World Series, not the 1939 World Series.

That particular picture was taken in the top of the second inning in Game 1 of the 1940 World Series. Hank Greenberg singled off Red’s starting pitcher Paul Derringer and Rudy York followed with another single. Bruce Campbell followed with a sacrifice. In this photo, Pinky Higgins has just laced a two run single as Greenberg and York are scoring. The Reds’ pitcher is Paul Derringer. The Reds’ third baseman is Billy Werber and the shortstop is Billy Myers. The Reds’ left fielder is Jimmy Ripple.

Cyclone792

07-09-2008, 12:32 PM

Any one know or recommend where I could buy framed pics similar to these?

These pics are way cool and would look great on my walls.

That's a good question that I'm not sure about. I wonder if it would be possible to take some of the pictures from these files and actually have them printed in good quality. Maybe there's a photographer or three out there that would know that answer. One of the things that's great with some of these pictures is how sharp they are.

Roy Tucker

07-09-2008, 12:35 PM

Man, what *great* photos. What I'd give to be at some of these games.

Thank you, Cyclone.

westofyou

07-09-2008, 12:40 PM

That's a good question that I'm not sure about. I wonder if it would be possible to take some of the pictures from these files and actually have them printed in good quality. Maybe there's a photographer or three out there that would know that answer. One of the things that's great with some of these pictures is how sharp they are.

Some of the photos can be had on the American memory site.

http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/index.html

Like this one

http://memory.loc.gov/ndlpcoop/ichicdn/s0618/s061862.jpg

Some you can order in TIF format.

Others like the Baseball card site

http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/bbhtml/bbhome.html

Allows you download TIF format, then you can print those... they are HUGE (75 Mgs) but some are in pristine condition and worth framing, I have a bunch like this one on my walls.

http://memory.loc.gov/pnp/bbc/0000/0000/0005fr.jpg

Cyclone792

07-09-2008, 12:41 PM

The Babe visits Johnny Vander Meer on June 16, 1938 after his 2nd no-hitter in a row.

I've got another question. What part of Cincy was the Palace of the Fans located?

It was right where Crosley was. The stadium was called League Park but the grandstand that was so wonderfully designed was "The Palace of the Fans".

OnBaseMachine

07-12-2008, 01:26 AM

It was right where Crosley was. The stadium was called League Park but the grandstand that was so wonderfully designed was "The Palace of the Fans".

Thanks Chip. :)

WVRedsFan

07-12-2008, 01:38 AM

Having attended games at Crosley in my youth (I was 2 :)), it was the perfect ball park in may ways. Yes, it was small, but Reds pitchers had low ERA's and the fielding was good. I remember Eddie Kasco, Leo Cardenas, and others (Gene Freese comes to mind), but the pitchers were more intelligent. Just an opinion here. We field dumb which shows the minds are not in the game. I miss Crosley.

Homer's Ghost

07-12-2008, 01:52 AM

[QUOTE=Cyclone792;1687939]
Crowd at Wrigley Field - Chicago, July 27, 1929

http://baseball-fever.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=38681&d=1207019120
[/img]
Awesome thread cyclone. It's just wierd being there a few days ago, the main grandstand at Wrigley looks largely unchanged. Obviously the bleachers are different, but it just gives me a sense of how much history that place has.

[QUOTE=Cyclone792;1687939]
Crowd at Wrigley Field - Chicago, July 27, 1929

http://baseball-fever.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=38681&d=1207019120
[/img]
Awesome thread cyclone. It's just wierd being there a few days ago, the main grandstand at Wrigley looks largely unchanged. Obviously the bleachers are different, but it just gives me a sense of how much history that place has.

Also funny how everbody is dressed the same, hats and all.

That was the first ever recorded picture of the Baseball's first "White Out".